Eight seconds of Eternity
by Zelda Ophelia
Summary: Pre-series. Before she joined homicide, Flack and Angell worked a scene together earlier in their careers. Chaos ensued. For the 8 second challenge, prompts were "Flack/Angell, in the line of duty".


_**August, 2003**_

_One one thousand._

Another day, another drive by shooting. At least that was the way it felt sometimes. The only redeeming factor so far (if you ignored another gangbanger being taken off the street, albeit in a body bag instead of cuffs) was the eye candy that was also on duty. Not that he was going to say that out loud, because he was fairly certain that Officer Angell would object to being referred to as eye candy. For one thing, that completely discounted the fact that she was a great cop. Who just happened to also be hot. And could probably kick his ass, considering her training partner once mentioned she had been near the top of her academy class in hand to hand.

Pen in hand, Flack forced himself to refocus on the witness who had yet to give him a usable piece of information. Out of the corner of his eye he noticed a dark SUV rounding the corner.

_Two one thousand._

One second she was trying to calm down a hysterical witness who was going on and on about the black SUV - no maybe blue, it could possibly have been a crossover and why wasn't that detective listening to her, she had important information about what she had witnessed - that had gunned down the vic.

The next, said hysterical witness was pointing at an SUV that was barreling down the street and screaming at the top of her lungs. "That's it!! That's it!!"

Looking up, Angell could see the muzzle of a gun poking out of the window. She immediately shoved the witness to the ground, shouting at the detective on the scene. "Flack! Gun!"

_Three one thousand._

He didn't stop to think, he just reacted. Drawing his sidearm he pushed the witness behind him and out of the way. They were lucky to have some cover: his car, Angell's black and white, and the coroner's van. It wasn't much but, he thought to himself as the first bullets began to strike the aforementioned vehicles, it was a start. Beside him the man he had been interviewing lay on the ground in the fetal position, hands covering his head as he whimpered. Flack didn't blame him - two drive by shootings in less than an hour were enough to make anyone crack.

Glancing to his left he could see the assistant coroner huddled behind his van. To the right, Angell was trying to cover another bystander and preparing to return fire.

Another bullet hit far closer than he was comfortable with as he caught her eye.

_Four one thousand._

Hand signs weren't the best for giving instructions. Especially, and she hated to admit it, when you aren't really certain you're remembering them correctly. She knew, instinctively, that it was just nerves and Flack wasn't really trying to tell her to cartwheel down the street, but that was what it seemed like. The hysterical witness, now even more so, wasn't helping. Finally, though the analytical portion of her brain insisted that 'finally' was actually after only milliseconds of indecision, she moved. It made sense. She had more cover where she was. And a pretty good shot at the vehicle.

Taking a deep breath, she rode the wave of adrenaline, aimed her gun and fired.

No amount of training prepared you for something like this.

_Five one thousand._

He started to move as soon as she fired, using the distraction of her cover to make his way to a better vantage point. They didn't have much time left, the SUV is almost past them. He needed a license plate number. And a way to stop the vehicle or to get the shooter. But definitely a number if it got away.

Right at that instant he was more concerned with keeping his witnesses safe and alive than apprehending that vehicle and its occupants. That shooter came back for a reason. Someone saw something. And they want that person silenced. Flack wanted to keep that person alive to tell what they saw.

_Six one thousand._

She could do this. She kept telling herself that as she emptied her clip at the back of the SUV. She may have caught a tire, but she wasn't certain. The only thing she iwas/i certain of was that she was going to hit the firing range more often. Angell had been on patrol for almost a year and she could count the number of times she'd actually fired her weapon on one hand. In terms of shots fired, she'd more than doubled that statistic.

She had just gotten her last bullet off - no time to reload - as the gun switched from shooting at Flack and his witness to shooting at her. She dropped to the ground. She didn't have as much cover in her new position, but she likely made a better target than her witness. She could only think of one reason why they'd come back for more. And she was pretty certain Flack had the same idea.

The shots and their echos dimmed to silence. It was over.

_Seven one thousand._

It was gone. Took a left at the corner and he already had his radio out to relay the tag information and call in the new incident.

Flack looked around as he spoke, seeing that the coroner's assistant had abandoned the DB to give first aid to someone who had been caught by the shooter's bullets. Since it was only the one woman and she was sitting up, he was willing to score the situation a tentative win. They hadn't lost anyone. They had new information for the case and could hopefully track down the owner of the SUV. He would have liked to have gotten the vehicle and the shooter, but he'd prefer this option to getting them and having more vics on their hands. He'd been in homicide for just over a year now and he still hadn't gotten the hang of notifying next of kin. He didn't think he ever would.

The CSIs weren't going to be happy that their scene was contaminated by a second shooting, but from what he'd seen of Taylor he had a feeling the other detective would understand. Messer would give him crap about losing the shooter, but Danny would shut up when he kicked his ass at hoops on the weekend. Then he'd just be bitching about that for the next month.

On his other side Angell was still on the ground, having pulled herself up into a sitting position. And looking inordinately relieved.

_Eight one thousand._

"You okay?"

She nodded as he pulled her up from the ground. His hand seemed very warm and thankfully he didn't mention that hers was shaking. _Adrenaline_, she reminded herself. _He'd understand._

"Good." He shot her that grin of his. "You know, we make a good team."


End file.
